Steff Lee loved drawing and making comics as a child. She became interested in animation when watching a Disney Channel special on the making of Pixar’s A Bug’s Life. Her influences include manga and anime, any animation from Disney to Studio Ghibli, a love of travel and her mixed heritage. She describes her love for animating, “one of the most exciting parts is when you see your characters come to life. I love it every single time, it never gets old.”
Steff graduated in 2008 with a degree in Design and Animation from Norwich University of the Arts. After graduating, she freelanced part time as an animator and directed her first film before landing a full-time role as a Junior Artist illustrating and animating children’s games. After a couple of years Steff missed the creative freedom and flexibility of freelance life and decided to set up Steff Lee Studios. In 2018 she and her partner Jack launched their own animation studio, Kino Bino.
Based in Leicester’s Cultural Quarter, Kino Bino primarily creates character based 2D animation for the education, healthcare and business sectors. They have worked with a range of clients both locally and internationally including TedEd, TedxLeicester and recently the BBC. A highlight has been Kino Bino’s most recent education project created for BBC Bitesize, working alongside Tentacle Media creating animations to help children learn new languages. They worked with a consultant to write songs in Mandarin Chinese and created character animations dancing to the tracks.
Steff has also been invited to exhibit work at the TedxLeicester women’s event at the end of 2020. Working freelance and running her own studio means that Steff hasn’t encountered the type of barriers that can exist for women who work in agencies or other organizations. But she acknowledges that there are few female senior film directors and animators across the industry and sees both equality and diversity as key issues that need to be addressed.
We caught up with Steff to find out more about being a female Creative Director in animation and her advice for new animators.
How did you first become interested in working as an animator?
I was always a creative kid. I loved drawing, making comics and messing around with my Dad’s camcorder. It was a Disney Channel special ‘The Making of Pixar’s A Bug’s Life’ that I saw when I was 12 that really got me hooked on the idea of animation. I just thought it looked a really cool job!
Tell us about your career path of how you got to where you are now.
To be able to study animation at university I pushed through art & design at school, even though all I really wanted to do was make cartoons on my computer. After that, I did a one-year art foundation course to build my portfolio and was able to make some of my first pieces of animation.
I went on to study Design and Animation at Norwich Art School, graduating in 2008. There weren’t many full-time creative job options so I set myself up as a freelancer alongside working part-time in a shop. In 2010 I finally had my first full-time animation job, drawing and animating cartoons for children’s online games. After a few years of that I missed the freedom of freelance life and so decided to dive back into the self-employed world. I operated under Steff Lee Studios for another few years before convincing my partner to quit his job and join me on a business adventure. We set up our animation studio, Kino Bino in 2018 and have been working together ever since.
BBC Bitesize
We were brought in on this project due our experience in Mandarin education. We worked with another studio to help write the Mandarin songs and then designed and animated the characters dancing to the tracks. I loved working on this project and being a former student of Mandarin, it was so much fun to create content for kids to learn the language. This was also our first BBC Education job which made it even more exciting.
How have you grown over time and developed throughout your career?
I have definitely become more confident in talking to people. Speaking to clients, running meetings and networking were all things I hated in the beginning. Confidence in my design choices and decisions has strengthened too. As well as knowing when to stop on a project and not be too much of a perfectionist.
How has being a woman impacted your career?
I don’t know if being a woman has impacted my career specifically. If I have missed opportunities because I’m a woman I will never know. Part of me has wondered if I’ve been given opportunities because I tick the female box, but I hope that’s not the case as I’ve worked hard for my successes. We worked with TEDxLeicester last year and were excited to be invited back to exhibit our work at the TEDxLeicester Women event at the end of 2020. This was a wonderful opportunity to hear talks by some amazing women but also to get our work out there.
I have been lucky enough to work alongside some wonderful people, and unsurprising for the industry, the majority of them have been men. I can only think of one occasion where I was in a meeting and felt a little uncomfortable because of a boys club atmosphere. But after that initial meeting I didn’t experience it again and it didn’t impact the project or the working relationship.
Recently, there has been lots of discussion in the industry around the gender pay gap and how few women progress into senior roles. Have you experienced this yourself and do you have any thoughts on how we can counteract this imbalance?
I have read a lot about the gender pay gap across all fields, but if I’ve not experienced it personally that I’m aware of. In my first full-time job all the juniors started on the same pay grade. I was only there for a few years so I can’t say if others were progressing faster than me.
When I was freelancing I may have charged lower than some of my male counterparts for the same work. But that was me not being confident enough to ask for more. Whether or not that’s because I’m female I don’t know.
For me, I didn’t wait for the opportunity of a promotion, I just set up my business and made myself Creative Director. I work with my partner and we split everything equally as well as ensuring all our freelancers are paid fairly.
Within larger organisations there are definitely issues with fewer women in senior positions. To counteract this, I think it’s important that we admit there is an imbalance in the first place, tackle the issues that could be causing it, and highlight the benefits of having a diverse range of people in leadership positions.
The Chinese Myth of the Immortal White Snake
In your experience, do you think there is equality and diversity for men and women across the design industry today?
This is difficult for me to answer as I haven’t worked within a studio structure for many years. In my experience I know so many fabulous female designers, artists and directors who are all doing their own thing and are amazing at what they do, but I know I’m in my own bubble. Motion graphics tends to be a very heavily male-dominated industry (The 2019 Motion Design Survey) but it seems that the animation industry in the UK it’s more equally split. (Inclusion and diversity in the UK’s VFX, animation and post production sectors).
If you could go back to the beginning and start your career again what would tell your younger self?
- Don’t put so much pressure on yourself. You don’t have to be working 24/7 to be successful. Find the balance that works for you.
- Don’t be precious about your work. It can be easy to get defensive when a client doesn’t like what they see but at the end of the day they have to be happy with the final work. Find the right balance between the client’s needs and your design choices.
- Always take into account the client budget and what you want for the project. Don’t overstretch yourself or do huge amounts of work for free, as it can not only damage you and your standing but the industry as a whole.
- Don’t compare yourself to others. Getting caught in the trap of thinking everyone is better than you is one of the worst things you can do. Everyone is a work in progress and at different stages. If you want to improve your skills the only person you need to compete with is yourself.
Do you have any words of advice for women considering a career in design today?
- Believe in yourself and practice building your confidence.
- Put yourself out there, share your work and take feedback constructively.
- Find what you love and do more of it.
- If you dislike something, don’t just put up with it. Change it, be flexible.
- Never stop learning and growing.
- Keep yourself inspired, read, experiment, learn new skills.
Where do you see yourself in 5 years’ time?
I used to be a big one for making strict plans but have realised that it pays to be flexible (especially after 2020 being so unpredictable.) Ideally, in 5 years’ time I would still be making animation and illustration, working on some larger projects, collaborating more with others and perhaps have another director credit under my belt. But if that will happen, who knows! I will try my best but will also adapt to whatever life throws at me.
Which female designer or animator has most inspired you?
I wish there was a female animation director I could name who has inspired me to have a creative career, but to be honest, there weren’t a lot of them around making films when I was young. The only group I can think of were CLAMP, an all-female manga artist group. I used to copy their artwork obsessively.
Nowadays thanks to social media I’m inspired by so many talented ladies that it’s hard to choose. Some of my favourites are Audrey Kawasaki, Loish and Pernille. I’m also part of the Panimation group which is full of wonderful work by women, trans and non-binary folk working in animation and motion design.
I do want to give a shout out to fellow Midlands based animator and business owner, Mair Perkins. We knew each other online but met in person when I first went freelance full time. She was a fount of knowledge and so helpful and supportive in those early days. She’s definitely a source of inspiration for me.